M: Embracing The Shadows
by WhyDoYouWantToKnow
Summary: A new villain comes to Jump, but it seems to be impossible to defeat, or even injure. Will Raven gain enough control of herself to destroy it, or will she lose control of her demon in the process? Rated M for violence, and possible language in future chapters.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: Two chapters for two stories in two days. What kind of madness is this? I really wanted to try out a darker story with no romance in it, so this was thought up. I hope that you all enjoy it, and please review if you like it. I hope you all have a nice night :D**

* * *

The bright light of the moon cut through the inky blackness of the sky. The park of Jump City was silent, save for a few wandering couples. A man wrapped his arm around the young woman who was walking with him. A giggle left her lips as he led her off the path and to a more hidden area.

Bright crimson eyes watched as the man pushed the girl gently against the tree and started to kiss her neck. Saliva ran down the muzzle of the beast, dripping from its mighty jaws onto the ground. It's muscles twitched in anticipation as he stayed to the shadows of the trees. He silently stalked closer to the couple until he could taste the emotions rolling off of them. The beast's tongue flicked in the cool night air like a whip, savoring the thrill of the silent energy around him.

The beast turned and looked toward a tree just across from where the couple was. He stared at it and silently used his powers to make it break. A streak of fear melted into the atmosphere as the couple looked around. The beast could hear the pounding of the woman's heart as she asked the man what it was. The man's heart was beating just as fast, if not faster, than the woman's, but he did his best not to show anything. Desire, fear, and uncertainty danced in the silence of the night. The beast circled ever closer to the pair until he was only mere feet away. A quiet growl left his throat, just barely audible in the heat of what was going on before him.

The man paused as the sound met his ears. The woman looked up as he stopped and froze. Her skin went white as her scream was stuck in her throat. The man looked at her confused before turning to see what she was staring at. A mighty roar left the beast's throat as he lunged at the pair, signalling that death was coming for them. The man put his arm up to try to block the creature, but it was useless as he was knocked to the ground. The beast pinned him, and put his own face next to the mans. The man yelled at the woman to run as the beast took in the sweet smell of the man's fear.

The beast's breath was noxious with the scent of rotting flesh coming from it. Saliva dripped onto the man's face as he took in another breath. Before the man could do anything else though, the beast sunk its fangs into his neck and ripped it out. Blood sprayed onto the beast, the man, and the ground as the flesh was torn from him. The beast swallowed, savoring the taste of meat in its mouth before turning and looking for the woman who had left. He quickly picked up her scent and followed it, flitting from shadow to shadow and blending in with the dark.

The monster quickly caught up to the woman, and tackled her to the ground, pinning her beneath him. The bones of the woman crunched as they were broken from the force of the impact. The beast couldn't savor this woman like he had the man, because she had started to scream. He quickly ripped out her throat as he had done the man's as her shriek pierced the night

* * *

The alarm pierced the silence of Titan's Tower as it started to ring. Raven quickly jumped out of bed and threw on her uniform before using her soul self to disappear and reappear in the living room. She noticed a very awake Robin, who probably hadn't been asleep yet, a slightly tired Starfire, Beast Boy curled up on the couch hugging a pillow and trying to fall asleep again, and a less than pleased to be awake Cyborg.

"Titans, there's trouble at the park. Raven can you get us there quickly?" Robin asked the sorceress. Raven nodded and enveloped the group in the black of her soul-self, then flew them quickly to the middle of Jump Park. The first thing Raven noticed when they got there was the eerie stillness of the night air. The second thing she noticed, was the feeling of a presence watching her. She couldn't pick up anything human in the park though, whatever it was they were up against was clearly not mortal, and never had been. The third, was the feeling of pure evil power clogging the air. It sent chills down Raven's spine

"Everyone, be careful. I don't know what we're up against, but it's a lot more powerful than what we normally deal with." Raven warned as she kept a lookout for what she was sensing. _I hope this isn't what I fear it is, _she thought to herself as she watched the shadows around the group. A surge of power and blood-lust hit Raven's senses as she put herself on guard. She could feel the creatures eyes watching her team. The feelings of anxiety and fear from her teammates was hard to focus through.

Anger flowed through Raven's mind as she felt how vulnerable her team was. They were sitting ducks to a target that they didn't know. A cold, dark, male voice rang out through Raven's head. _Come and find me half-breed._ It sneered at her, _If you can even do that much. I bet you can't even touch me let alone hope to fight me._

Rage flared at this challenge. Who was this creature to challenge the daughter of Trigon when he wouldn't even show his face to them. A chuckle in the night made Raven turn to look behind her, only to see a the vague outline of a dark figure vanish into the shadows.

"Dude what was that?" Beast Boy asked before being silenced by the rest of the group. The snap of a branch from a tree caused Robin to turn and throw a birdarang in the direction of it, but it did nothing more than lodge itself in the tree it was thrown at. Another snap caused the group to turn their heads the opposite way, but they were once again met with the image of nothing but shadows. The shadows however, seemed to keep coming closer and closer the more Raven stared at them. Raven shook the feeling off of her and continued to keep watch.

"Uhh, guys...I think we have a problem." Beast Boy choked out, voice wavering from the fear.

Raven turned quickly to face what he was looking at. Fear struck her when she saw what had been watching the team. The best was solid black. It's body seemed to be made of the darkness surrounding it, and no light made it any brighter. It's face was long, much like a dragon with a wolf's muzzle, and it's eyes glowed an eerie crimson. It had no pupils, only the slights of red showing from the black. The creature seemed o have no mouth, and it hot breath poured from its nostrils into the cold fall night creating puffs of steam in the night. It's thick neck and chest seemed to swirl with the darkness it was made out of. It's legs were made of muscles and seemed to be tensed with anticipation. Small thick spines protruded like bones from the places where its joints were and on it's back, leading all the way down to the end of its whip like tail. The beast radiated power and impatience. It's thick, sharp claws dug at the ground as it stared down the half-demon. It's body wasn't thin, but a medium build, perfect for the power and strength that it had been bragging about in Raven's mind.

Raven moved out in front of the group. Her body language issued a silent challenge to the quadrupedal creature in front of her. The beast's muzzle ripped open, revealing the sharp daggers of teeth in its mouth, and with a roar it accepted the challenge. The creature swiftly ran towards the half demon, only slowing when it noticed the group leap into an attack formation.

"Titans, go!" Robin yelled as he threw two exploding disks at the creature. It merely laughed as it knocked them away with its tail. A tentacle of dark energy came up from the ground next to Robin, wrapped around him, and slung him into the tree closest to him with enough force to cause it to crack upon impact. The impact knocked the breath out of Robin, and he laid there for a moment, trying to regain his bearings of what was going on.

Seeing that Robin was injured, Cyborg and Starfire started blasting him. The blasts sunk into the creatures being, causing no physical damage as he absorbed the attacks. The creature's body began to swell as they kept attacking. It looked as if its body was starting to warp and twist with the attacks. Raven's smile at the thought of them hurting it was quickly destroyed though as the beast ripped open its mouth and fired the blasts back at Starfire. She dodged and rolled, trying to avoid the flying balls of black and green energy coming at her, but eventually one of them hit her. Starfire yelled as she was knocked out of flight by the blast and smacked into the ground, creating a small hole at the impact zone.

Fury drove Beast Boy as he transformed quickly into a velociraptor and ran towards the monster. Cyborg's blasts kept being absorbed by the creature's body, and he was running out of ideas. The beast sprung back from Beast Boy as soon as he got close enough to attack. The creature twisted in the air and landed thirty feet away, letting its front legs sink into the ground upon impact. Seeing a hole in his defense, Raven sent a blast of dark energy at the beast. He merely absorbed it as if it had never even existed. Beat Boy prepared for another attack, but before he could start two shadowy figures rose from the ground.

Two equal sized velociraptor stared at Beast Boy for a second before launching their attack. The shadow duplicates were evenly matched in the power category, but their numbers made it hard for him to keep up. Beast Boy quickly transformed into a hawk and took to the sky. In a blink of an eye a black hawk and a black eagle followed in his ascent. He couldn't defend himself. One of the shadow creatures grabbed his left-wing in its talons, the other grabbed his right and they held him there in the air hopeless. Beast Boy was just about to transform, when a bright blue and black bolt hit him from the ground. He dropped as the creatures let go of him and returned back to the land.

Raven watched as the creatures sunk back into the earth they had come from and the main beast brought his claws back up from within the ground. The creatures long, thin tongue ran over his fangs and muzzle as he stared down the girl. _Only one more to go before it's just you and me, half-breed. _It sneered at her.

Before Raven knew what was happening, Cyborg jumped up from behind the creature and went to hit it from above. A tentacle came from the creature and grabbed the man before the attack could land. The beast dangled Cyborg in front of him, debating on what to do. Raven took this opportunity to launch a tree at the creature, but before it made contact a familiar looking dark shield came up to protect the beast. The tree hit it, but was broken in half as it continued on past its intended target. Raven's anger built at the nonchalant way it was preventing her attacks and ignoring her as an opponent. She was the one that had issued the challenge to it, not her team, and now she was the one that it was ignoring.

The monster lifted up one of its claws and drug it down Cyborg's robotic half, destroying the metal and circuits that made up part of him. Cyborg yelled at him to stop and tried to wiggle free of his grasp but failed. Raven could practically see the sadistic grin on the beast's feature and he slowly started to crush Cyborg with the tentacles. The sound of metal being crushed was loud in the night's still air. Once the beast had gotten Cyborg to the point he could fight back he threw him away like he had Robin, and Raven watched as he crumpled to the ground.

The monster turned and put its full focus on Raven as she fought with her demonic half. He chuckled darkly as he sensed what was happening within her mind. _Aww, what's wrong? _He started to tease her, _Can the poor little half-breed spawn of Trigon not control her better half? _

At these words, Raven's control snapped. Rage took over and started to attack him. The creature dodged many of the tentacle attacks, but a couple of the bolts she had fired at him had grazed his body, injuring him slightly. The creature tapped into his reserves of power and two more eyes appeared on the side of his face before he launched another attack at her. His claws raked Raven's shoulder and arm as he leaped at her, causing blood to drip from the open wound. Raven howled in pain at the hit and sent another barrage of attacks at him.

The shadowy being started to tire of this quickly and started to make more concentrated attacks, aiming to assert that he was the dominant one of the fight and that this was now his territory. Raven roared at these attacks as they made contact, piercing the inky blackness that had come out of her cloak. Raven jabbed at the creature, stabbing one of his back legs with her energy and making a hole that went all the way through. She shrieked a sound of demonic joy at the attack, and laughed as he hit the ground hard. She now had the upper hand.

Raven pinned the other creature down with her tentacles, but roared as he sunk into the ground and reappeared behind her. The beast launched into the air at her, and tore through her cloak and outfit with his dark energy, slicing through her skin in multiple places. Raven roared in pain and anger as she shrunk to the ground. She had been defeated to an extent and the power was taking its toll on her physical health.

Raven threw up a shield to try to block the demon that was now prowling around her. Fear crept into her mind as she realized she was now powerless against the creature. The creature laughed and drug his claw down the shield, shattering it around the girl. Raven slowly crawled backwards, trying to get away from the beast that was staring her down. The beast launched at her and Raven braced for an impact that didn't hit. The beast phased through her, and as Raven realized this a sharp, burning pain invaded her mind. Raven turned to look at the beast before the pain overcame her and she succumbed to the darkness that enveloped her.


	2. Chapter 2

The first thing Raven noticed when she awoke was that her head felt as if she had a thousand white hot knives poking at it. The second was the faint sound of a heart monitor in the background, signaling that she was in the med bay of Titan's Tower and not at the park where she blacked out. The third, was that her limbs were restrained to the bed with heavy steel clasps.

_What happened to me? _Raven mentally asked herself as she squinted to look around. Robin and Cyborg were talking in the corner in quick, fierce whispers, and it was obvious Robin wasn't happy about something. Raven sensed the tension in the air of the room and the anger and fear that rolled off the two men. Anger bubbled up inside Raven, but a sharp pain in her head quickly drowned out the feeling as an alarm went off net to her.

"Rae, calm down. You're safe in the tower and we're trying to figure out what's wrong with you. Take a deep breath." Cyborg instructed her, and as Raven did so, and calmed down, the sharp piercing ring of the alarm died out. Raven tried to speak, but quickly realized she had no voice at the moment. She motioned to Cyborg for something to write with. He searched around for a couple minutes before finding and handing to her a piece of paper and a pen.

_What happened, how did we get here, and why on earth am I tied down?_ She wrote quickly. She wanted to know what was going on. The last thing she remembered was the fight and then everything was black. Cyborg sat down in the chair next to her bed with a guilty look before he started to speak.

"I know you know what happened Rae, but as for the other two. You did your thing and got us back here, but when we arrived you kinda snapped. The whole four eyes and all. It didn't last long though, you kinda screamed and then passed out. It was a safety precaution." He said. A look of shame crossed Raven's face. She started to wonder how she had lost control around her friends, they weren't a threat and she wasn't in any danger once they had returned.

A dull throbbing in Raven's head tried to distract her. It honestly irritated her that it was there. That, mixed with the fact she had lost control, made her a little angry. Before she knew what was going on, red started to tint her vision. She felt her teeth elongating into fangs, but quickly got herself under control. She looked up at Cyborg and noticed that fear was written on his face. What was going on with her and the control she once had?

"Rae," he started to ask, "What is happening with you? I haven't seen you this out of control in a long time." Worry and concern were evident in his voice, along with fear.

_And now he's scared of me again. Nice going Raven. _She thought to herself. She grabbed the pencil and started to write again.

_Can I go please? I need to meditate and figure out what's going on with me. _She asked. Cyborg thought for a minute before sighing and undoing the restraints that were keeping her attached to the bed. Raven rubbed the areas where the restraints had been to try and regain feeling in them. Honestly, Raven was slightly worried about meditating. If Rage had gotten loose then the Titan's definitely had something to worry about. Rage had grown stronger ever since her father's defeat, but she had also been growing more out of control. She couldn't risk hurting the team.

"Rae, just try to control yourself. I know you won't come to anyone if it gets bad, but please remember we're here for you." Cyborg reminded her. Raven nodded and left the infirmary to head to her room. She had hoped she wouldn't have met anyone on her way there, but whatever gods there were seemed to have other plans for her.

Beast Boy stopped Raven in the hallway, and insisted on discussing what "that freaky thing was that kicked our butts" at the park the night before. Raven entertained his questions for a few minutes, but soon found his constant questioning to be irritating. Her head throbbed again as she started to see crimson. Her fangs and claws grew and Beast Boy noticed this.

"Woah, Rae, what's going on?" He started to ask. A demonic shriek came from Raven's lips as she lunged at him. Beast Boy dodged quickly and transformed into a small fly to escape up an air vent. Once Raven had control of her body again, she pulled her hood up in shame. Although she had felt annoyed, that was no reason to attack him.

Raven quickly teleported to her room and sunk to the ground. She didn't know why her demon half kept taking over her. All she knew was that she had let Rage take over to harm her enemy last night and had gotten Rage back under control right before she blacked out. After that she guessed her mind teleported she and the team back to the Tower as a defense mechanism, and Rage had attacked the team.

A sharp jab of pain hit Raven's mind as she thought. _What if that demon last night somehow shattered Rage's binding in my mind? _seemed to be Raven's main thought. The demon was powerful, but she didn't think it was powerful enough to shatter Rage's bindings she had carefully placed in her mind. Raven sighed and went to search her dresser for the mirror into Nevermore. Once she found it, she sat in the center of her floor and stared into it, allowing herself to be sucked into it.

* * *

Raven landed harshly on the barren wasteland that was Nevermore. The rocks seemed to just out at odd angles and the once rolling meadows and hills were now just burnt and baked earth. _Strange_ she thought _This is supposed to be Happy's domain, but there's nothing here. It's almost as if it was scorched into oblivion. _Raven suddenly felt very on edge. Something was very wrong in her mind and she needed to figure out what it was quickly. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the stones lining up a path for her to walk on. It was obvious that she needed to follow the trail her mind was giving her.

The path was extremely long, and the constant fear of attack by a possibly free Rage made it seem even worse. Raven must have walked for more than twenty minutes before the path even began to give a hint of changing. Raven took this time to consider what was going on. Her emotions were missing, she couldn't control her demon blood, and there was an extremely powerful demon out to get her that seemed to have a personal issue with her. This couldn't end well. It took her a bit more walking before she came to a new area.

Raven gasped as she saw the ruins that were once the dwelling area of timid. The stones seemed to have been crushed as if they were no more than building blocks instead of hard stone. Raven ran her finger over one of the rocks that were next to her. Feeling of sorrow and regret bleed off of them onto her. Raven quickly moved away from them and looked around for her emoticlone. Unfortunately though, she, like Happy, had seemed to have vanished from Nevermore. Raven couldn't even sense the two.

She silently made her way over the rubble and onto the two faced statue that she knew was at the end of it; however, it seemed to have also been destroyed. Deep claw marks were embedded into the statue and the withered trees that surrounded this area. Raven tried to sense Brave and find her, but again her search was fruitless. Worry crept over Raven's skin as the rocks once again formed a path for her. She wasn't sure she wanted to continue with this, but she knew she had to.

The more Raven searched her mind, the more she panicked about what she was going to have to face. Wisdom's library had books shredded and papers scattered along the outside, along with the building itself burning in the cold wasteland of Raven's mind. Love and Lust's are had been scorched much like Happy's had. Sloth's domain had been ruined. Rude's area had claw marks all over it along with burning pieces of tree and sparse grass.

The claw marks had been found in every area. Whatever had done this to Raven's mind, it seemed to be rather proud of that fact. It definitely didn't want to hide from Raven, it wanted her to know that her mind belonged to it. This unsettled Raven even more, but what was worse was the definite lack of her emotions. It was as if none of them had ever existed to begin with. A cold emptiness spread over Raven as she realized this. She felt as if pieces of her own character were missing, which they were.

Raven gulped as she realized where the next path had to lead her. There was only one place she hadn't been, and that was Rage's domain. The fire that seemed to sprout from the cracks in the path added to her momentary unwillingness to move ahead. Raven steeled her nerves as she prepared to face whatever Rage had planned for her inside.

Raven walked calmly as she made her way there. The fire that kept popping up through the cracks seemed to be more for effect than as a weapon, as it didn't burn Raven. Raven was ready for Rage. She had beaten her many times, and knew that this time would be no different. Rage certainly wasn't as strong as Trigon, and she had defeated and sealed him away, so why was she still so unsure of her own mind? Raven didn't have an answer for that, but she did know that she would defeat Rage one way or another if she did turn out to be the cause of this.

Once Raven had reached and entered Rage's domain, she pulled her cloak around herself. Claw marks were over most of the rocky terrain, and lava oozed out of some. The smoky sulfuric stench of the area made Raven want to gag. The flames leaped at her, and singed the bottom of her cloak. Raven walked towards the middle of the area, where Rage should be held.

Raven gasped as she saw the empty stone wall. The iron chains were connected to the wall still, but the middle of them had been shattered. Rage was nowhere to be found, but in the center of the wall were four long claw marks. Bright orange and yellow lava ran from them like blood from a wound. The sheer magnitude of what this meant suddenly dawned upon Raven. She needed to figure out what was going on, and fast. She also needed to warn the Titan's to be careful around her.

Raven quickly floated over the rest of the terrain and made her way to the portal out of her mind. Her last thought before the darkness swept her into it was that the demon she had met had to have something to do with this happening. She didn't know how or why, but she needed to find it and defeat it before it did something worse to either her or her friends or she would really know what it was like to have the wrath of the daughter of Trigon upon it.


End file.
